the Third Tank

by Ed Robinson

Before the end of WWII the American military was preparing to invade Japan.
Maui Island was the location of many practice beach landings using amphibious
tracked vehicles that could move across the waters and then climb onto land.
The coastline of South Maui is now strewn with many relics from this era
including at least five (known) of these amphibious tractors or "Amtracs."

Know one knows exactly how or why these tracked vehicles ended up sinking
over the reefs of Maui, but it is easy to speculate the harsh wind chop of
afternoon tradewinds may have been involved. The benefit today is the numerous
artificial reefs and the fish they attract.

One of the most spectacular Amtrac wrecks is our dive site the "3rd Tank"
which of course was misnamed by the author many years ago (Hey, I was
a conscientious objector in the Army! Even though I was assigned as a medic
to a tank company in Germany.) Anyway they are not tanks as was pointed out
to me several years ago.

The 3rd Tank (dive site) is off Makena Beach and is surrounded by acres of
sandy bottom so it has become the fish magnet of this area. Large schools of
Yellow-tailed goatfish (Weke) and Blue-lined Snapper (Taape) surround the small
wreck and create a spectacular tight school of flowing color.

On and around the wreck we always find local resident eels, leaf-scorpionfish,
lobsters and the occasional octopus on eggs. A hundred feet from the wreck
is also a bed of endemic Hawaiian Garden Eels.

This dive is a photographers dream of both wide-angle and macro photo subjects
all compacted in a small area.

This dive site is available on our 3-tank Adventure and 2-tank Adventure-X
dives (mainly.)